Media Creates Political and Ideological Controversies Essay

Media Creates Political and Ideological Controversies - Essay Example Audiences are seen to be susceptible to any message or information that is presented by the media. As per Lowery and DeFleur’s theory media has an immense impact on its viewers. This theory endorses great power and influence on the media. Although later research disproved this theory, it was evident through the findings (Hyman & Sheatsley 1947) that audiences were not brainless recipients of information and formed their own opinions of media’s projections of news and events. But fact remains that even though media coverage may not be able to completely form a public’s opinion on just one front, it is responsible for how they view the world. This is where the agenda-setting theory of mass communication comes in. while the media may not be able to tell us exactly how we should think, it does specify what we should think about. â€Å"The agenda-setting theory was originally developed to explain the influence of the mass media in determining which political issues become important in elections. Adroit committee members and politicians claim that if you can control the agenda you can control the meeting.† (Sutherland & Sylvester 2000). Basically, the most crucial function of media is to act as a gateway between the public and the government. It’s the media who provide information regarding political matters and matters regarding policy and governance. Newspapers aim to cover politics and issues related to politics follow the guidelines that journalists must remain â€Å"politically correct† and neutral and â€Å"present† covering all sides of the argument (Sloan & Mackay 2007) Research has shown that most media slant is focused on coverage related to political and election campaigns, where media needs to influence the general public. But very few researches have been done to check why the media slant is involved in such  specific issues such as â€Å"immigration† and why is it covered by â€Å"negatively† slanted media coverage.